Entertainment

Old Ideas With a New Coat of Paint

After I read Mark 'Rizzn' Hopkins' post on Mashable last night about how Google's Chrome is not a Windows killer something about the post started to get my thoughts going, but I couldn't really put them into words at that point. Then I read a post today by Jackson West on Valleywag where he said:

Mainframe terminals, or keyboards and monitors attached to a big piece of iron in a subbasement somewhere, probably built by IBM or DEC. While proponents of what until recently was called server-side computing have now opted for the friendly-sounding "cloud computing" moniker

At this point a couple things solidified for me and regardless of how much the Web 2.0 bunch might like to think that they have invented something new with this whole cloud computing thing the fact is that this isn't anything new at all. While most of the javascript jockeys might like to think that this cloud computing is so cool and a product of the Social Media Web 2.0 generation, the reality is that in one form or another we have had something like this since before the time of Bill Gates' speech pointed to by Mark yesterday.

From the first time that someone dialed into a mainframe hidden in some clean room somewhere to when the first Web application connected to Amazon's S3 service we have been using remote dump sites for storing our data or running software. I still remember when Sun proclaimed that the thick client was dead and everyone would be moving to a thin client architecture and running all their software from a central server.

It wasn't long though before that whole thin client idea went the way of the dodo bird. Except it really didn't because we see the same idea now with everyone pumping out the PR swill about the great benefits of cloud computing.

Funny enough I am writing this post using Google Docs and will then copy it over to the back end online editor at Mashable's blog site; which is actually hosted nowhere near any place that might be called their office. Google Docs of course is that company's interpretation of what software from the cloud will be like; just as Microsoft has their own interpretation with Office Online.

Everyone is wanting to get us all excited about data portability and global access to their data (which in and of itself is a great idea). It was also a great idea when some programmer remotely compiled a program on some gigantic DEC or IBM server; they were at that point were leased from the big computer manufactures and the company paid for their time using it. It was also a great idea when a worker in a cubicle could access a document on a co-worker's machine a floor or half a world away.

The value of the idea has never changed in all these years - only the delivery method has. Now, as we float through the haze of the warm and fuzzy goodness of cloud computing the reasons for doing this aren't the same. At one time; especially during the height of the client/server ideology, it was about making it easier for the workers to access their data. Now, it is all about companies like Google, Microsoft, Amazon and other cloud computing platform providers find new ways to lock their customers in and make a fortune doing so.

Sure, much of the cloud computing service available at this point is free for us to use after all free makes it so much easier to get people willing to use the services. It is like the drug dealers though, with their "the first hit is free" cloud computing providers know that once they have you locked in and have your data there aren't any other alternatives.

Companies the size of Google, Microsoft and Amazon don't do anything out of the goodness of their hearts - everything boils down at some time to a profitable bottom line. They might be willing to give up short term profits but you can be guaranteed that at some point someone is going going to have to start paying for these services. Advertising is simply not going to be able to cover the immense costs of these clouds.

As it is, Microsoft and Google are forking out hundreds of millions of dollars per data center with more and more coming online all the time - someone is going to have to start paying for all of this. Where once companies like IBM and DEC held companies ransom over just the plain access to giant mainframes we now have equally huge companies holding open the gates to their clouds.

The simple fact is that at this point they are the one's with the keys to our data not us, which makes them, or cloud computing, no different than what we had some twenty plus years ago.

It's the same greedy pigs just with a new coat of makeup - there is no real difference when you come to the basic principals of the whole idea. One generation's client/server is another generation's cloud computing.

Mashable
is a global, multi-platform media and entertainment company. Powered by its own proprietary technology, Mashable is the go-to source for tech, digital culture and entertainment content for its dedicated and influential audience around the globe.